Anthony Cacace dethroned Joe Cordina as the IBF super-featherweight champion by stopping him in eight rounds in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia.
At the Kingdom Arena, on the undercard of the undisputed heavyweight title fight between Tyson Fury and Oleksandr Usyk, he produced his finest performance to consistently outwork Cordina, and to ultimately bully him into defeat.
Wales’ Cordina, 32, had previously won all 17 of his fights as a professional, but as recently as fight week he spoke of his plans to move to lightweight, and until he was rescued after 39 seconds of the eighth round it was tempting to wonder if he had struggled to make 130lbs.
Cacace, 35 and from Northern Ireland, had regardless long been expected to establish himself as a world-level fighter, and consistently imposed himself on Cordina after a one-sided third round.
He had swung and fallen short with a wild left hook towards the conclusion of the first, but in the third, having already landed a left hand on the break, he hurt Cordina with another, and to the extent the worst round of Cordina’s career unfolded as he struggled to survive. Two further left hands and a left uppercut also punished Cordina’s inability to defend himself, and another left hook finally knocked him down.
A hurtful right-left combination hurt Cacace in the fourth, and demonstrated that Cordina appeared to have recovered. They then exchanged left hands and when Cordina’s made the greater impact it appeared likely he would build some momentum, but the reality is that that was as encouraging as his evening became. Cacace landed another left hand but at the expense of absorbing a right, and from the fifth largely reestablished control.
After Cordina landed another left-right combination, Cacace – who increasingly looked the heavier handed – hurt him with a right uppercut, and in the sixth, when they fought more on the inside, Cacace’s work-rate meant he repeatedly had the edge.
Cordina was hurt again by another right uppercut while trapped towards the ropes in the seventh, and in the eighth another punishing flurry of punches left Cordina struggling to remain upright and to defend himself, and forced the referee Bob Williams to intervene.
The German heavyweight Agit Kabayel earlier enhanced his hopes of earning a shot at a version of the world title when he defeated the disappointing Frank Sanchez in seven rounds.
Kabayel, like Sanchez 31, had in 2020 been in contention to challenge Fury, and while he remains short of the world’s leading heavyweights he continues to improve, as he demonstrated by inflicting Cuban Sanchez’s first defeat.
Sanchez had already gone down after a vicious body punch in the seventh round and struggled to return to his feet when another meant he failed to reach the count of 10. Twenty-seven seconds remained of the seventh round.
By Declan Warrington